Pole Positions

In the first stop on his European trip, President Trump spoke to a large crowd in Warsaw and called on NATO countries to do more to protect the western way of life, confirmed US support for Article 5, and commented on Russia’s destabilizing role in Ukraine.

+ The biggest moment of the trip will be Trump’s sit-down with Putin; and the biggest question mark is whether Trump will call out the Russian leader for his election hacking ways. In Warsaw, Trump didn’t seem to veer far from his usual refrain: “I’ve said it very simply. I think it could very well have been Russia. I think it could well have been other countries. I won’t be specific. But I think a lot of people interfere. Nobody really knows. Nobody really knows for sure.” (Editor’s note: Everybody knows.)

+ “The president often doesn’t read the usual briefing books and relies on in-person briefings, the officials said, so aides also have written a list of tweet-length sentences that summarize the main points Trump could bring up with Putin.” LA Times on what to expect during the Trump/Putin meeting.

+ Fred Kaplan: When Trump Meets Putin: “The peril of a full-blown meeting between Trump and Putin — of something more elaborate than a brief hello and, maybe, an exchange of views, a brief and well-monitored probe of possibilities — is that Putin has a goal and a policy, while Trump doesn’t but seems eager to come home with something. That’s when diplomacy can be most risky.”

+ Who’s gonna be in the room where it happens? Reports suggest it will just be four officials and two translators.

+ NYT: China Sees Opening Left by Trump in Europe, and Quietly Steps In (with Pandas). And the EU and Japan just struck a trade deal.